EAT-ing Your Words: 6 Tips for Ensuring Google Can Trust Your Website

On August 1st, 2018, a new Google algorithm update — informally dubbed “Medic” — sent the SEO community into a laser-focused research frenzy. The source of their curiosity? A newly-prioritized set of principles collectively referred to as E-A-T: expertise, authoritativeness, and trustworthiness.

The E-A-T-focused update wreaked havoc on several previously high-ranking sites, seriously impacting a slew of financial KPIs in the process. However, though the algorithm’s impact was sometimes detrimental to established sites, its intentions were rooted in an urgent cultural need: helping web users parse the credibility of their sources.

In the era of “fake news” and online misinformation, Google’s E-A-T principles provide increased scrutiny to ensure the content it ranks in top positions can be trusted. Information that can impact the safety or well-being of its searchers — such as medical, legal, or financial content — must be handled in especially careful ways to earn the trust of the search giant.

E-A-T compliance is crucial for both trusted, established sites and ones still seeking to cement their reputation. No domain holder is spared from having to provide signals of trustworthiness to both Google’s human quality reviewers and its search algorithm.

So, how can you make this game-changing algorithm tweak work for, not against, your business?

Our Director of SEO, Lily Ray, contributed to the whitepaper: ” EAT-ing Your Words: 6 Tips for Ensuring Google Can Trust Your Website.” The tactics and example strategies provided in this whitepaper will instruct you on how to incorporate E-A-T best practices on your website to improve your visibility in the wake of the recent changes.

Path Interactive is a performance-driven digital marketing agency with offices in New York City and Nashville. Our team provides deep expertise in a full suite of results-oriented marketing services including PPC management, SEO, social media and display/digital media advertising.